Page:The Bothie of Toper-na-fuosich - Clough (1848).pdf/53

 I shall not go at all, said He, if you call me Mr.Thank heaven! that's well over. No, but it's not, she said, it is not over, nor will be. Was it not then, she asked, the name I called you first by? No, Mr. Philip, no—you have kissed me enough for two nights, No—come, Philip, come, or I'll go myself without you. You never call me Philip, he answered, until I kiss you. As they went home by the moon that waning now rose later, Stepping through mossy stones by the runnel under the alders, Loitering unconsciously, Philip, she said, I will not be a lady, We will do work together, you do not wish me a lady, It is a weakness perhaps and a foolishness; still it is so, I could not bear to be served and waited upon by footmen, No, not even by women— And, God forbid, he answered, God forbid you should ever be ought but yourself, my Elspie, As for service, I love it not, I; your weakness is mine too, I am sure Adam told you as much as that about me. I am sure, she said, he called you wild and flighty. That was true, he said, till my wings were clipped by Elspie. But, my Elspie, he said, you would like to see, I fancy, Something of the world, of men and women. You will not refuse me, You will one day come with me and see my uncle and cousins, Sister, and brother, and brother's wife. You should go, if you liked it, Just as you are; just what you are, at any rate, my Elspie. Yes, we will go, and give the old solemn gentility stage-play One little look, to leave it with all the more satisfaction. That may be, my Philip, she said, you are good to think of it. But we are letting our fancies run-on indeed; after all It may all come, you know, Mr. Philip, to nothing whatever. There is so much that needs to be done, so much that may happen. All that needs to be done, said he, shall be done, and quickly.

And on the morrow he took good heart and spoke with David; Not unwarned the father, nor had been unperceiving; Fearful much, but in all from the first reassured by Adam. In the first few days after Philip came to the bothie They had become hearty friends, full of trust the one in the other: And in these last three he had talked with him much, and tried him. And he remembered, how at the first he had liked the lad; and,